Bill O’Reilly claims Stephen Colbert is damaging America

Income inequality is a fact of life, get used to it Bill O’Reilly says. The Fox pundit believes Stephen Colbert is ruining America.Comedy Central

Call it the clash of two Irish America’s. Pugnacious pundit Bill O’Reilly is hopping mad after late night satirist Stephen Colbert took him to the woodshed on the "Colbert Report" for comments O’Reilly made about income inequality in the United States.

Last week O’Reilly made the case that physical inequality was the same as income inequality and that nothing – especially by the government – could really be done about it.

“I will never have equality with my fellow Irishman Shaquille O'Neal. He is bigger and stronger than I am by nature... Each human being is born with abilities. But they are not equal abilities,” O'Reilly told his viewers, insisting government should stop any kind of government interference with the economy.

Colbert agreed with O’Reilly’s claim that the pursuit of equality is unnatural, adding with a smile, “Shaquille O’Neal is taller than Bill O’Reilly, therefore the richest 1 percent of Americans should control 40 percent of the nation’s wealth.”

It’s not a secret that Colbert has modeled his gangbusters commenting style on O’Reilly himself, so O’Reilly couldn’t pass up the opportunity to needle his most accomplished critic.

On Monday O’Reilly claimed that Colbert is simply an “ideological fanatic” and a “deceiver” who is damaging America. He even appeared to blame him for the UCONN riots, which he attributed to the new disrespect for authority that apparently Colbert promotes.